The Two Main Types of Online Optimization

It seems like only yesterday that the big hype in online marketing was SEO (search engine optimization). Now that we have gotten used to that term, things have changed again and we are supposed to focus on SMO (social media optimization). This is the latest huge buzz, and if you’re not in on it, then you are seriously missing out. So how as all of this happened?

The world of internet changes all the time, and it is important to understand that, although SMO is the big buzz right now, SEO is not dead. In fact, no marketing technique is dead. After all, you still see billboards and newspaper advertisements as well, don’t you? But it does mean that you have to learn about what is changing and, most importantly, how you can keep up with it.

SEO and SMO – An In-Depth Look

Social media is a fantastic tool to promote businesses and engage in eBranding. When it was first suggested, it was a bit of a pilot, but it took off massively. Today, this type of marketing is actually competing with some of the marketing veterans and big cats, including paid advertising and SEO. However, those two forms of advertising do also continue to be hugely important.

SEO is a very effective, tried and tested method of marketing that helps to make sure websites are found in the important search engines, Google being the most important one. These techniques help websites become visible through improved positioning and they increase their online presence. This is achieved by making sure relevant traffic is sent to those sites.

SMO, by contrast, doesn’t focus on the search engines, but rather looks at how interconnected people are through social media, using that send messages across. There are a number of clear advantages that SMO holds over SEO, including the fact that they can use more audio visual media, that they can network, that they can build relationships and that they can share information. Because social media has quite literally exploded, these tools are absolutely vital in terms of promoting a brand and spreading awareness.

However, SEO has a number of advantages as well, as does PPC (pay per click) advertising. The biggest one is that they still use search engines in order to get more traffic to a site. Search engines continue to be more commonly used than social networking. Furthermore, it is much easier to optimize a meta tag in SEO than through social media. Through SEO, a brand actually receives a face. They can have sponsored links and banner ads, making sure they are visible even when people aren’t looking for them. Plus, more and more frequently, it enables the use of audio visual materials.

So which one of the two is going to win in this battle of the giants? It is like that the two will actually have to find a way to co-exist. It is believed that the internet is now about as big as it is ever going to get, so it is now about fine tuning tools, rather than reinventing the wheel.